Being a blessing

A guilt free blog post! All courses are now complete for school. I submitted my next draft of my Major Research Paper on Friday night and am awaiting comments and more editing.

Mark and I spent all day yesterday outside doing some major clean up. We didn’t do as much fall clean up as we should have, and we’re paying for it now. Since we moved in the fall, I am not sure what spring perennials to expect. I don’t have much gardening experience with flowers, so I am having a difficult time identifying the new buds and sprouting I’ve seen. I do see some tulips growing though, my favourite flower!

Before working outside, Mark and I headed to Home Depot with coffees in hand. This is the closest thing to a “date” that we’ve had in a while, and it was so nice to walk the aisles dreaming of and planning all the things we’d like to do with our house over time.

The key part of the previous sentence = “over time.”

We have such big plans! It’s a challenge to watch our favourite HGTV shows (where renovations seem to happen fairly quickly, easily and with little concern for money) or browse Pinterest where pictures of remodels are beautiful and grand, and then look at our house and see what needs to be done, what we want to do, and the finances we have (or don’t have) to work with. And it’s definitely not fun re-prioritizing as other things come up – like plumbing. Plumbing is definitely not at the top of my “fun priorities” list! Or replacing a deck that we weren’t planning on touching for at least a couple of years.

At the end of the day, it’s not about having a beautiful house. It’s about having shelter to protect us from the elements. It’s about the family you spend time with inside and outside. And it’s about welcoming loved ones and strangers, being able to use your home as a place of blessing and hospitality.

I saw this printable on Pinterest, and it completely resonated with me. My house is a place of refuge for me. But I also want it to be a place of refuge for others – for A.J. and future kids, for extended family, for friends, for others who will come into our lives and are looking for a place of rejuvenation.

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